Cabinet approves extra €100 million in funding for First Home Scheme

Cabinet has officially approved extra funding to be allocated towards the First Home Scheme.

Yesterday (September 10), the Minister for Housing, Darragh O’Brien, brought a memo to Cabinet to ask for approval to grant the extra funding.

The First Home Scheme was initially launched back in July 2022, and provides first-time buyers with an option for the Government and certain banks to pay up to 30% of the cost of their new home, in return for a stake in their property. 

Before the Cabinet’s approval of extra funding, the current fund for the scheme stood at around €480 million.

Around 11,000 buyers have registered for the scheme since it began over two years ago, and 5,400 applicants have been approved for the funding. However, in an update published in July of this year, it was revealed that just 1,914 people have been able to buy a home with the help of the First Home Scheme.

The same update added that the average amount of support received by each buyer was €65,803. 

Speaking about the First Home Scheme, Taoiseach Simon Harris recently stated to RTÉ News that its expansion could “potentially benefit up to 4,000 more people in buying their own home.”

The Taoiseach added: "That's the sort of action you need to take on housing, week in, week out, in Government to make progress."

However, opposition party Sinn Féin has remained critical of the First Home Scheme, arguing that it is not helpful to first home buyers in the long-run. 

The party has also insisted that, if elected into Government, they would abolish the scheme, with Sinn Féin’s housing spokesperson Eoin Ó Broin recently alleging that the First Home Scheme “piles additional high risk debt onto buyers”.